eugeniosegala/MAKO render-v5.0.0

MAKO Renderer v5.0.0

on GitHub

Looking for Decky integration? Download the latest MAKO Decky release.

What's new in MAKO Renderer v5.0.0

Release codename: Phoenix

“In the deepest dark, the phoenix kindled a tide the abyss had never known.”

Tavian Rook, Annals of the Ember Tide

Phoenix introduces MAKO FG, bundled open-weight Frame Generation for SteamOS and Linux. At 3×, shared motion work can turn 30 FPS into 90 FPS when the game and GPU sustain it; 2×, 4× and other output schedules are also supported. Free for non-commercial use, with no Lossless Scaling required. See the model card for design, benchmarks and limitations, or download the model and runtime from Hugging Face.

• MAKO FG: V1.24 ships for 64-bit and 32-bit x86 games, Flatpak runtimes and self-contained AppImages. Supports Fixed and Adaptive Frame Generation, SDR, HDR and Flow Scale. If MAKO FG fails, it restarts while the game keeps its real frames. It is the default for profiles without a saved model, including profiles from earlier releases. Developed by Eugenio Segala. See the setup guide.
• Choose your model: Pick MAKO FG, LSFG Quality or LSFG Performance per profile and power mode. Switching between MAKO FG and LSFG needs a restart; LSFG Quality and Performance switch live. LSFG and LS1 require your own Lossless Scaling installation. Failed LSFG starts fall back to MAKO FG without changing the saved choice. A missing DLL keeps that choice; the editor changes it only when a present DLL fails validation.
• Tune MAKO FG: Flow Scale trades motion detail for GPU cost. Ultra Performance uses 60% Flow Scale and MAKO Scaler when Scaling is on. Supports frames up to 8,294,400 pixels (the area of 3840×2160) and 8192 pixels per side; the analysis grid may be capped at higher resolutions.
• MAKO FG Mode: Quality, Balanced, Performance and Extra Performance switch live and control how often motion is fully estimated at 2× and 3×. Balanced and Performance correct motion between full estimates; Extra Performance uses cheaper reuse when frames arrive evenly and correction otherwise. Start with Balanced; try Quality for artifacts in fast motion. At 4× and above, every pair gets a full estimate. Ultra Performance uses at least Performance.
• MAKO Scaler by default: Profiles without a saved scaling method use MAKO Scaler; existing choices stay. Eligible paths write directly to presentation images, and HDR bridge paths resize without a game-side resize.
• Record frames for comparison: Opt-in burst and rolling capture save real frames locally for offline comparisons. Rolling mode buffers recent frames until saved; burst pauses Frame Generation. MAKO Decky provides the L3 + R3 shortcut when armed. See recording setup and limits.
• Mailbox Presentation: Optional compatibility setting for FIFO hangs or failures, off by default. Requires a restart. Where supported, MAILBOX replaces queued frames with newer ones, which may reduce smoothness.
• MangoHud real FPS: Count Real Frames Only excludes generated frames from MangoHud's FPS counter. Requires a restart and follows the existing host MangoHud restrictions.
• Adaptive and bridge pacing: Skips recovery probes that cannot succeed and drains queued Gamescope refreshes after sustained timing drift. Adaptive restores normal pacing within seconds when a game's clock outpaces the display at the chosen multiplier, reducing queue buildup and stutter.
• OpenGL games through Zink: Fixes swapchain failures and uneven pacing after loading screens. With Base FPS Cap off and a known Gamescope refresh, Fixed mode paces eligible Zink games at refresh divided by the multiplier; Dynamic Cadence Recovery keeps that cap off. RADV display-compression and Game Mode composition workarounds address colour speckles and tearing. See setup and limits.
• Even pacing on the desktop: Outside Gamescope, generated frames are spaced evenly when total output is below display refresh, helping capped games and low-FPS video. This can add up to one real-frame interval of latency; spacing switches off when it would slow the game. Game Mode is unchanged.
• Games Steam starts with its older Vulkan loader: Fixes Frame Generation when Steam's shader pre-caching layer loads above MAKO, including non-Steam AppImages, and prevents related X11 window crashes.
• Proton 8 and 9 offscreen windows: Applies Wine's workaround on the first enabled Renderer launch, fixing offscreen Frame Generation in games such as Half-Life 2. If video or UI displays incorrectly, set WINE_DISABLE_VK_CHILD_WINDOW_RENDERING_HACK=0 before mako-launch. Other Proton versions may use different paths; see setup and limits.
• MAKO FG in games with large per-thread data: Fixes MAKO FG startup in games with large thread-local allocations, including some native ports.

🎮 In-game considerations

Every game, renderer, and display setup behaves differently. Compare Fixed Frame Generation, Adaptive Frame Generation, and scaling-only operation one setting at a time. If Frame Generation, Scaling, or Shaders do not work, test Fullscreen, Borderless Fullscreen, and Windowed; none is universally best. For Scaling, also test in-game resolutions and verify that the input is smaller than the display. Changing display mode can change GPU cost. Restart after changing a setting labelled (Restart). Flow Scale changes and switches between LSFG Quality and LSFG Performance normally apply live and may cause one brief hitch while MAKO replaces their private resources.

• Adaptive target behaviour: Adaptive varies the generated-frame count toward an average target. It cannot reduce a native frame rate already above that target, and the result still depends on the selected multiplier plus available GPU and compositor capacity.
• Quality and latency tuning: Higher multipliers and lower real-frame rates can increase ghosting and input latency. Smooth Cadence may improve motion consistency while reducing responsiveness, so compare the available choices per game.

Installation

Choose the right download

GitHub's automatically generated Source code ZIP and tarball contain source code, not ready-to-run MAKO Renderer packages. SteamOS users who want the managed plugin workflow should use the separate MAKO Decky release.

Host archive

Download MAKO-Renderer-v5.0.0-linux.tar.xz, extract it into a new folder, then use the included graphical installer:

1. Double-click Install MAKO Renderer.
2. Choose Execute if your file manager asks.
3. Confirm the installation. The wizard verifies the package, installs it under ~/.local, safely updates existing files, preserves profiles, and opens the configuration UI.

To remove it later, open Uninstall MAKO Renderer from the application menu. The wizard removes MAKO-owned files and keeps your profiles unless you explicitly choose to remove them.

The host archive includes 64-bit and 32-bit Vulkan layers; the CLI and Qt UI are 64-bit.

Reopen the configuration UI after installation:

• Application menu: On Steam Deck or Steam Machine, switch to Desktop Mode, open the bottom-left Application Launcher, search for MAKO Renderer Configuration, and click the MAKO-logo app icon.
• Terminal: Run ~/.local/bin/mako-ui from Konsole or another terminal. Do not run it with sudo.

Configure the profile in the UI or ~/.config/mako-render/conf.toml. Select the licensed DLL path when using the optional Lossless Scaling frame generation model or LS1 scaling, then use ~/.local/bin/mako-launch %command% for a direct Steam launch.

Arch Linux package

Download mako-renderer-bin-5.0.0-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst and leave it unextracted. Open a terminal in the folder containing the downloaded file, then install the verified system-wide package with:

sudo pacman -U ./mako-renderer-bin-5.0.0-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst

The ./ prefix refers to the terminal's current folder; this command does not download the package. If you saved the file elsewhere, use its full path instead. If pacman reports could not find or read package, check the path and exact filename, or download the package again if it is missing.

The package installs MAKO Renderer under /usr, preserves profiles under ~/.config/mako-render, and does not touch MAKO Decky's user-local Renderer under ~/.local. Use either the system package or the user-local installation as the active owner for a user; see the Arch package guide for coexistence details.

After installation, open MAKO Renderer Configuration from the application menu or run mako-ui, create a game profile, and use /usr/bin/mako-launch %command% as that native Steam or Proton game's launch option. Installing the package alone does not activate MAKO globally.

Flatpak runtime extensions

Download and extract MAKO-Renderer-v5.0.0-flatpaks.tar.xz. It contains one self-contained MAKO extension for each supported Flatpak runtime. Install the extension matching the application runtime, for example:

flatpak install --user org.freedesktop.Platform.VulkanLayer.makorender-24.08.flatpak

Updating an existing MAKO Renderer installation

1. Quit every game or application currently using MAKO Renderer.
2. For a user-local installation, download the newer host archive, extract it into a new folder, and run Install MAKO Renderer again. For the Arch package, download the newer .pkg.tar.zst and run sudo pacman -U on it.
3. If you use Flatpak applications, download the matching Flatpak archive and reinstall the extension for each runtime you use.
4. Restart the game. Revalidate the configuration with mako-cli validate if you changed the DLL path or profiles.

Keep the previous archives until the new version has been tested with your games.

Before you play

• Test MAKO per game. Start with Frame Generation and Scaling disabled, then enable one path at a time before combining them.
• If you use a Lossless Scaling frame generation model or LS1 scaling, confirm the detected Lossless.dll path before launching. Leaving it blank permits normal discovery. MAKO Scaler does not need it.
• Do not combine MAKO with another frame-generation or scaling Vulkan wrapper for the same game.